


What He Feels

by Merfilly



Category: Mars Series - Burroughs
Genre: Drabble, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-22
Updated: 2007-03-22
Packaged: 2017-10-07 22:20:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/69832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tars Tarkas looks at the evolution of his heart</p>
            </blockquote>





	What He Feels

He learned affection, love even, with a woman in the retinue of Tal Hajus.

Both were supposedly extinct in the hearts of the great hordes of Thark, as they were for the hordes of Warhoon, all the other green Martians.

That affection was a closely guarded secret, holding him to another emotion, that of hope, during his long time away.

When he returned to find the woman dead, a darker emotion, the need for vengeance, was nurtured just as stealthily in his heart. This, at least, was in keeping with the one emotion allowed all their kind, the emotion of hate. Hate for the red ones, hate for each other, hate for themselves.

Until the day a strange man from Jasoom taught him yet another emotion, the feeling of friendship to such extent he might even call the man 'brother' as the red men did.

Through that warrior-brother, he came back, full circle to affection and love, albeit a different one. The secret of his beloved, now long dead, was revealed to him at last.

Mighty Tars Tarkas, Jeddak of all Thark, would harbor love for all his days, toward Sola, the daughter of the woman who first nurtured everything he could feel. No longer would a green Martian be forbidden to love or seek the higher emotions, not so long as he ruled.


End file.
